The summer doldrums have not been getting Jay Inslee down, as our “green” governor revs up his re-election campaign. In the most recent look at his campaign calendar, we watch Jay jetting off to Aspen to hobnob with big donors, make a stop in San Francisco on his way home (wonder if Tom Steyer came to visit him at the airport, to save a flight to WA, and reduce his carbon footprint), and still manage to put in just over 10 hours in actual work for the people who pay his salary – Washington taxpayers.
So, let’s review the week of August 8, starting with a whole 30 minutes of work on the Monday – in the form of a phone call with his chief of staff. The rest of the day was all “personal time”.
For Jay, Tuesday was even less stressful, as he was able to avoid any actual governing. His day started after 9 am, and went until almost8 pm, but with nary an official item on his schedule. Taxpayers sure got their money’s worth that day.
Hump day was Jay’s only real work day – keeping with a trend in recent weeks – as he put in six-and-a-half hours of state activity, including a meeting with lawyers from the Attorney General’s Office about the carbon rule he wants to impose via executive order. Wonder if the lawyers gave him good news about that effort? But it wasn’t all work on Wednesday, as Jay still fit in a fundraising lunch with Vulcan, before knocking off at 5 pm.
Then Jay was off to Aspen for the Democrat Governor’s Association (DGA) summer retreat, with an early morning flight. He did slip in a 15 minute “official” phone call to KOMO radio – I suspect his campaign did come up – before largely checking out until the weekend. His only official business while hanging out with the big DGA donors in the mountains was a 30-minute call with his executive team on Friday.
Inslee did hustle back Saturday – after his San Francisco stop – to borrow the state plane for a trip to Bellingham for an Alcoa picnic. Perhaps he shared with that company’s executives the results of his carbon rule meeting from earlier in the week.
Then it was Sunday off, to rest up after such a touch schedule. That’s your “green” governor at work (and play).
